Link groups made up of a group of physical links connecting network nodes are commonly used in data packet networks. When a network node forwards a packet to a link group, the network node must determine which physical link of the link group will carry the packet. Known solutions for distribution of traffic over the link group include the use of fields of a delivery header of the packet in a polynomial equation that produces a distribution of traffic.
The distribution function works fine, so long as the delivery headers of packets have some variety in their fields. However, if there is little variety in the fields of the delivery headers, as is often the case with tunneled packets, known solutions tend to favor a subset of the physical links of the link group and therefore do not provide a good distribution of traffic across the link group. This resulting poor distribution is inefficient and may lead to discarded packets despite the link group having adequate aggregate bandwidth to carry the discarded packets.